“It is pouring rain,” said Mrs Underwood, “and he will get his death of
cold. Oh, how can boys be so incautious; and just when he has heard what
comes of it! Poor Leonard! I have not had time to think of him yet, with
all you have been saying; but when one thinks how well one knew him
once, and that he was our own flesh and blood! And Geoff doing the same
thing, the very same thing, in spite of such a warning!”
“You are insufferable,” cried Miss Anna; “hold your tongue, for Heaven’s
sake. Do you think the man died, whoever he was, only to give a warning
to your son?”
“I think nothing of the kind, Anna. Poor Leonard, there never could be
anybody more sorry: and his poor wife, I am sure my heart bleeds for
her: but Geoff ought to take example by him, all the same.”
“His wife?” Miss Anna said; and she laughed; “the wife of the man who
left England thirty years ago with a broken heart. It has been on my
mind ever since that I might have been kinder to him. I thought at first
I had killed him.” She laughed again. “I might have saved myself the
trouble. He is dead now of a wet night--a great deal more deadly a
thing than a love rejected; and here are you maundering about his poor
wife. His poor wife! I have no doubt she’ll marry again before the
year’s out. It’s the way of the world.”
“It is not the way of all the world, Anna,” said Mrs Underwood. She
would not make a direct claim of superiority on account of her
faithfulness, but she drew up her head a little and sighed, with a look
of conscious merit; at which Miss Anna laughed the more.
“That is true,” she said, “you’ve never married, Mary, nor wished to, I
believe. You are a superior creature. I ought to have made an exception
for you.”
“Not so superior as you think, Anna,” said the simple woman; “there is
many and many another like me, that would not, could not--oh, no, no,
for nothing in the world! Yes; I thought too that he never would have
got over it, he was so devoted to you; but he was young; if you will
remember, he was two years younger than----”
“Have done with these absurd recollections, Mary,” said her sister
angrily; “I want to hear no more of him. He’s safely out of the way now
at last; and there’s his--there’s these girls to deal with. If I had
only been by myself and had all my wits about me I should soon have
settled these girls; but I never have it in my power to act for myself.
There was Geoff standing by with those glaring eyes of his--not that I
am afraid of his eyes. They don’t know a single thing, these girls. If I
had taken my own way I should have asked them here, and made much of
them.”
“Oh, Anna, dear! I always said you had such a good heart!”
Miss Anna paused to look at her sister with contemptuous toleration.
“Was any one talking of my good heart?” she said. “But, never mind, I
should have taken them in--in every sense of the word. I would have been
Aunt Anna to them. I would have packed them off to their mother with my
love and a little present. To have to do with fools blunts the sharpest
intellect. That is what I ought to have done. And it was all they
wanted. To find their English relations, to get up a little sentiment;
that was all they wanted; they have money enough; and they did not know
a thing, not a thing! To think I should have missed my opportunity like
that! A bit of china that would have got smashed on the voyage out, and
our love; they would have written us gushing letters and talked of our
kindness all their lives.”
Mrs Underwood, good woman, was puzzled. She did not understand what this
meant. “If they had known you, Anna, I am sure they would have--loved
you,” she said, faltering a little. This was not always the result of
more intimate knowledge in Miss Anna’s case, but her sister had a
robust faith. Miss Anna cast a contemptuous glance upon her, but it was
not worth her while to argue.
“If it had not been for your son I would have done it,” she said; “what
could have been more easy? If Geoff had been out in the world, as I
always said he ought to have been, in chambers of his own, not tied to
our apron-strings, out of my way----”
“Anna! you never said such a thing before! You have always said you
liked to have him at home.”
“I like a man in the house,” said Miss Anna; “I don’t deny it. There is
an advantage in having a man in the house, if he would hold his tongue
and do what he is told; but as you have never known how to hold your own
tongue about anything, Geoff understands all our affairs. What is the
use of talking? I could have done it, but the opportunity is over. Now
there is that little spitfire with her imagination all aflame. I should
not wonder if she thought there was a dukedom dormant in the family, and
a romantic vast estate that we are keeping from her; and Geoff with his
ridiculous ideas and all that false nonsense about honour----”
“Geoff has no ridiculous ideas,” said his mother, flushed and tearful;
“there is nothing false about Geoff. He is honour itself, and sense and
judgment; and he is as true as the day--and----”
“Everything that is perfect, we all know.”
“I did not say that; he has his little faults, like all of us. He is a
little hasty; he is perhaps too generous; but as for interfering with
any kind thing you meant to do, Anna, you are mistaken, quite mistaken,
my dear. Let me go and see them to-morrow; poor things, poor things! of
course one wants to be kind to them. And to think that Geoff would have
had any objection! For that matter,” the mother said, faltering a
little, “he has always so many invitations; people are always asking
him; he might go away upon a visit while they are here.”
“That is an idea,” said Miss Anna; “but no, things have gone too far
now; besides,” she said with conscious malice, “that would balk me in
one of my plans. If the worst comes to the worst we might marry him--to
the youngest of them.”
Mrs Underwood sat bolt upright in her chair; the colour went out of her
comely cheeks; her very voice failed her. “Ma--arry him!” she said with
a gasp.
“They are both pretty,” said Miss Anna; “and especially the little
one--the younger one. I saw him cast many a glance at her. Oh, I notice
that sort of thing always. Though I never married like you, I was not
without my experiences. And I think I know. It would not have wanted
much on his side; and that would have saved your share of the money,
which would always be something if the worst came to the worst.”
Geoff’s mother had become incapable of speech as this dreadful prospect
was placed before her. She made a little movement with her hand, as if
to clear it away.
“Geoff is thinking of nothing of the kind, Anna. Geoff--has his heart
entirely in his home. He is just as simple-minded and as--pure-hearted
as when he was a boy.”
“Dear me!” said Miss Anna, “I thought it was the height of purity and
simplicity to marry early; I have always been told so. Some French young
men, who you know are the types of everything that is improper, can’t be
got to marry. But Geoff, being the best of good boys, of course will
want to marry as soon as possible; and here is a capital chance for him.
That was my plan, Mary--if the worst comes to the worst. If you have a
better, of course I have nothing to say.”
Mrs Underwood sat all limp and downfallen, every line of her showing the
droop of dismay and depression which her sister’s words, spoken in mere
mischief--for the idea of Milly, though it had glanced across her mind,
had gone no farther--had produced. “I----” she faltered, “Anna--I have
got no plan. How should I have any plan? If they have a right to--the
money, we shall have to give it up to them. And we will have to give up
our pretty house, and live in--the poorest way. He says, Never mind,
dear boy. He will work for us, he will never forsake us, Anna! Now you
will see what my Geoff is made of. He has the best heart; but it will
be a dreadful change, a dreadful change for him--he that has been used
to have everything he wanted all his life.”
“And you will rather let him fall into poverty, and be compelled to
work, and have us two old women hanging upon him and cramping him--than
save his share of the money for him and get him a nice young wife?
That’s what mothers are! I have always said, when they made such a fuss
about their children, it was themselves they were thinking of. Now, what
concerns me,” said Miss Anna with only the malicious gleam in her eyes
to contradict her dignified assumption of superior virtue, “what
concerns me is Geoff’s real advantage, not the selfish wish of keeping
him for ever at my side.”
Mrs Underwood’s countenance fell more and more. She looked haggard in
the sudden severity of the conflict set up within her. “I--thinking of
myself?” she said, almost weeping. But the accusation was too terrible
to be met with mere tears, which are fit only for lesser matters. She
gazed at her sister with large round eyes full of wretchedness. No crime
in the world was so dreadful to her as this of thinking of one’s self;
it is the thing of all others which cuts a virtuous Englishwoman to the
heart. “For Geoff’s good, you know, you know, Anna,” she cried, “I would
submit to anything. I would go to the stake; I would give myself to be
cut in pieces.”
“Nobody is the least likely to cut you in pieces, my dear,” said Miss
Anna coolly. “The stake is not an English institution. It is easy to
promise things that never will be asked from you. The question is, will
you let Geoff be happy, poor boy, in his own way?”
“Happy!” the poor lady cried in a lamentable voice; but then her voice
failed her, though a dozen questions rose and fluttered through her
mind. Could Geoff be happy in abandoning his mother? Would he give her
up for a bit of a girl who never could love him half so well? Was it
possible that there was anything wanting to his happiness now, watched
over and cared for as he was? She sat gazing aghast into the vacant air
before her, suddenly brought face to face with a question which was far
more serious even than the loss of the money. If the money was to be
lost, Mrs Underwood felt in herself the power of enduring everything. To
be housemaid and valet to Geoff would be, in its way, a kind of
blessedness; it would knit the domestic ties closer. She would have more
of her boy if they lived in a smaller space, in a poorer way; and with
that happiness before her, what did she care for poverty? But her
sister’s suggestion brought in an entirely different circle of ideas.
She saw herself dropping apart from Geoff’s life altogether. He, happy
with his young wife: she, set aside from his existence: and she looked
at that visionary picture aghast. To be cut in pieces was one thing, to
stand aside and let him go away from her was another. Was it all
selfishness, as Anna said?
“I see I have startled you,” said Miss Anna; “but it is too late for
anything now; that eldest girl is not to be taken in. She will fight it
out; she will drag us through the mire. Never mind, it was Geoff’s
fault, and Geoff will have to bear the brunt. But you will be able to
keep him to yourself, and that will be a consolation,” she added with a
sneer. “Never mind what he has to put up with as long as you can keep
him to yourself: that is everything to you, I know. And there’s the
dressing bell, Mary. We must have our dinner, whatever happens,” Miss
Anna said.
But Mrs Underwood, poor lady, did not have much dinner that day. She
came down to the meal in her pretty cap, but it was a haggard
countenance that showed beneath the lace. She could not talk nor eat,
but sat mute at the head of the table choked with natural tears. To
Geoffrey, who had come in hungry and full of thought from his wet walk,
there seemed nothing wonderful in his mother’s woebegone condition; it
chimed in with the tone of his own thoughts. To some certain extent she
would feel for him, she would sympathise with him, though even she could
never know the whole extent of the sacrifice he would be called upon to
make. The dinner was a very silent one. Miss Anna tried a few sallies of
her malicious observation, but in vain. The others were too much
depressed to take any notice, even to resent them. The old butler made
his solemn rounds about the table with a gradual increase of curiosity
at every step. Whatever was the matter? the worthy servant asked
himself. He was a north-countryman, and knew a little about the family
history; but an unfortunate chance had taken him out at the moment when
the strange visitor arrived who had caused so much commotion in the
house a fortnight since. The twilight hour, when it was too late for
visitors (as he chose to think) was Simmons’ hour for taking a little
walk, sometimes to the post, sometimes to the fishmonger’s, who had a
way of forgetting. He had missed the young ladies too, of whom the
housemaid had told such stories downstairs. But he saw there was “summat
up,” and he bent the whole powers of his mind, as was to be expected, to
make out what it was. When Miss Anna’s speeches met with no response she
turned to Simmons, as she had a habit of doing when she was in want of
amusement. “Did you hear any news when you were out for your walk?” she
said. “If it were not for Simmons I should know nothing about my
fellow-creatures. You never bring in a word of gossip from year’s end to
year’s end, Geoff; and what is the use of a man with a club to go to
every day if he never brings one any news? Simmons, you are a person
with a better sense of your responsibilities. Tell me something that is
going on outside. What’s the last news in Grove Road?”
“There is no news, Miss Anna, as I am aware of,” said Simmons, coughing
a little behind his hand by way of prelude. “There is nothink that is of
any consequence;” and then he began to tell of the gentleman at No. 5,
whose conduct troubled the entire neighbourhood. Miss Anna had an eager
interest in everything that was going on. She asked about the gentleman
at No. 5 as if she had no greater interest in life. Her beautiful eyes
sparkled and shone with eagerness. All the details about him were
acceptable to her. A spectator would have vowed that she never had known
a personal anxiety in her life.
Geoff sat late that night thinking over all that had happened and was
going to happen. He had begun to ask himself what he could do to make a
little money, and the answer had not been a satisfactory one. It is very
common in novels, and even in society, to represent every young man who
is without occupation as doing literary work and finding it always ready
to his hand. And, naturally, Geoff thought of that among other things.
But he did not know what to write about, nor to whom to take his
productions if they were written. He knew what he had learned at school
and at Oxford, but he did not know very much else. Classics and
philosophy are very excellent things, but it is hard to make money of
them immediately, save by being a professor or a schoolmaster, which
were occupations Geoff did not incline to and was not fitted for. He did
not understand much about politics; he was not deeply read in general
literature; he had no imagination of the creative sort. In short, like a
great many others, though he had all the will in the world to embrace
the profession of literature, which seems such an easy one, he did not
know how to do it; and to hope to support his mother and her sister upon
the few briefs which he was likely to get was ridiculous. As well
attempt to support them by sweeping chimneys. He reflected with a
doleful smile that even that required, if not special aptitude, at least
special training, of which he had none. He was thinking of this drearily
enough long after the rest of the household had, as he supposed, gone to
bed, and all was still.
Suddenly his door creaked a little, softly opened, and his mother stole
in. She was dressed in an old-fashioned dressing-gown, of what was then
called a shawl pattern, with a muslin cap on her head tied round with a
broad black ribbon. She had been going to bed, but had not been able to
go to bed without a little reconciliation and kind good-night to her
boy. “Did we quarrel, mother? I did not know it,” he said.
“Oh, quarrel, Geoff! we never quarrelled in our lives. You have always
been the best of sons, and I hope I have always appreciated you. I
couldn’t go to bed, my darling boy, if there was the least little thing
between me and you.”
“But there is nothing, mother,” he said, caressing the hand she had laid
upon his.
“Yes, there is something; I could not rest for thinking of it. Oh, is it
true, my darling, is it true that you want to be--married? If you had
that in your mind I would never stand in your way, you may be sure
never, whatever it might cost me. What is my happiness but in seeing
yours, my boy? I would never say a word. I would give up and go away;
oh, not far, to vex you, only far enough not to be spying upon you and
her; to leave you free, if you are sure it is really, really for your
happiness, my own boy.”
“Mother!” cried Geoff, staring at her, “I think you must have taken
leave of your senses. I--marry? at such a moment as this?”
“Anna thinks it would be the only thing to do. She thinks, Geoff, she
says, it is--the youngest of the two.”
Here Geoff, unable to quench entirely the traitor in him, blushed like a
girl, growing red up to his hair under his mother’s jealous eyes. “This
is mere folly,” he said, trying to laugh. “Why, I have only seen her
twice.”
“Sometimes that is enough,” Mrs Underwood said mournfully. “Things look
so different at my time of life and yours. I dare say you think it is
very fine to fall in love at first sight; but oh, when you think of
it--on one side those that have loved you and cherished you all your
life, on the other somebody you know nothing about--that you have only
seen twice!”
“My dear mother,” the young man said. He made this beginning as if he
intended to follow it up with a warm disclaimer and protestation of his
own superiority to any such youthful delusion. But when he had said
these words he stopped short suddenly and said no more.
His mother had her eyes fixed upon him, anxiously expecting to hear
something in his defence; but when he thus broke down, and it appeared
that he had no plea at all, no justification to offer, her heart sank
within her. She stood by him for a minute waiting, and then she put her
hand tremblingly upon his shoulder. “Have you nothing to say to me,
Geoff?”
“I don’t know what you would like me to say, mother,” he replied
somewhat impatiently. “What you are speaking of is preposterous. What
might have happened in happier circumstances I can’t tell--but that I
should think of marrying anybody just now, and above all one of the
people whose fortune we have taken from them----”
“Geoff! we never meant to take anybody’s money. We never dreamt that it
was not our own; we don’t know even yet,” said his mother, faltering.
“No; we don’t know even yet; and perhaps I am wrong in urging you to a
decision. Perhaps we ought to wait and see what evidence there is. It is
a hard thing to contemplate, anyhow, mother.”
“Oh, my dear! very hard, very hard! and if it separates you from me!”
“I do not see how it can do that in any case,” he said coldly. It
chilled him to think that her chief terror in the matter was lest there
should be any opening of happiness to him in it. It was preposterous, as
he had said; but still, was that the chief thing she feared--that he
should have a life of his own, that he should be happy? It made him
recoil a little from her. “Go to bed, mother; there is nothing that need
disturb your rest, at least for to-night.”
She would have stayed and questioned and groped into every corner of his
heart, if she could, and protested that it was for him, not herself,
that she feared anything; but Geoff was not so tractable as usual
to-night. He opened the door for her, and kissed her and bade her
good-night with something like a dismissal. Then Mrs Underwood perceived
by a logic peculiar to herself that Anna was right, and that her worst
fears were true.